1. Technical Field
The present invention relates to systems design and more particularly, to interactive optimization of systems design.
2. Discussion of the Related Art
Systems engineers are required to provide a design which balances conflicting objectives and, at the same time, satisfy multiple constraints and/or requirements. Examples of such objectives may be manufacturing and development costs, time-to-market, throughput, power consumption, usability and the like.
As Systems engineers consider many implementation aspects (such as hardware, software, and robotics), many design parameters may need to be explored in the process of reaching an optimal design. Non limiting examples of such design parameters may include: sensor sensitivity, engine efficiency, hardware/software partitioning, and optional features. Each possible design may be defined as a configuration (or combination) of design parameter values. The systems engineer needs to find the best design configuration—the one which optimizes the objectives described above.
Existing design workflows include a process called a “trade study”. In this process, different configurations are considered. For each such configuration the systems engineer needs to calculate the different “Measures of Effectiveness” (MoE), i.e., objectives from above, using appropriate techniques. For example, for calculating the cost a simple sum of the cost of the parts and the integration costs may be used. For calculating power consumption, simulations of the systems in different usage scenarios may be needed. After these calculations, the measures of effectiveness are often normalized and combined to a single value using a weighted average, and the best configuration (the one with the highest result) is chosen.
The existing approach suffers from several drawbacks as follows: the user has to explicitly enumerate the different configurations, and then manually perform the calculations—manually changing the simulation models if needed. This is a time-consuming and error-prone process. Further, the user may not even consider the best options. In addition, from a practical point of view, some of the design parameters are continuous values, with an infinite design space. Often, it is better to examine the different objectives and consider their trade-offs consciously, rather than relying on a weighted average which is used in many design optimization processes.